|
(Last Modified On 8/15/2013)
|
|
|
|
(Last Modified On 8/15/2013)
|
|
Genus
|
Russelia Jacq.
|
|
PlaceOfPublication
|
Enum. P1. Carib. 6. 1760.
|
|
Note
|
TYPE: R. sarmentosa Jacq.
|
|
Description
|
Small, wiry shrubs, sometimes appearing herbaceous, the stems mostly ridged or angled, glabrate or pubescent. Leaves opposite or verticillate, membranaceous to coriaceous, ovate to lanceolate, sometimes reduced and caducous, entire, serrate or deeply incised, venation pinnate, sometimes glandular dotted; petioles present or wanting, mostly short; stipules wanting. Inflorescences axillary cymose clusters, mostly pedunculate; bracts foliaceous, reduced upwards on the flowering stems; bractlets narrow, sessile, mostly pubescent; pedicels slender. Flowers showy red or pink, rarely white; calyx 5-lobed to near the base, the lobes apically narrow, mostly with hyaline margins; corollas tubular, slightly bilabiate, the mouth mostly not spreading, mostly glabrous outside, mostly pubescent near the mouth and at the point of the stamen insertion within; stamens 4, didynamous, included, the filaments inserted just above the base of the tube, often pubescent
|
|
Habit
|
shrubs
|
|
Description
|
basally, the anthers ovoid, the cells divaricate, a short staminode mostly present; stigma entire, included, the ovary 2-locular, the ovules numerous on an expanded placenta. Fruit a rotund capsule, glabrous, septicidal, the style persistent or forming a beak, packed with long hairs derived from the placentas; seeds numer- ous, small, oblong, or elliptical, longitudinally striate or sometimes reticulate.
|
|
Distribution
|
Russelia includes about 50 species, mostly Mexican, with one weedy species widespread in the neotropics and one species widely cultivated and escaping in the tropics.
|
|
Note
|
In Panama only the weedy R. sarmentosa and the cultivated R. equisetiformis are recorded. Species of this genus are usually easily recognized by the red or pink clusters of tubular flowers, glabrous outside, and by the angled stems.
|
|
Reference
|
Carlson, M. C. 1957. Monograph of the genus Russelia (Scrophulariaceae). Fieldiana, Bot. 29: 231-292.
|
|
Key
|
a. Plants nearly leafless; branches numerous and verticillate, slender; inflorescences 2-flowered; corolla glabrous inside; cultivated plant ...... 1. R. equisetiformis aa. Plants with abundant ovate leaves; branches mostly opposite or ternate; inflorescences several-many flowered; corollas pubescent inside; common weed ...... 2. R. sarmentosa
|
|
Tag
|
|
|
|
Project Name
|
|
Tag
|
|
|
|